Law enforcement officials are vastly expanding their collection of DNA to include millions more people who have been arrested or detained but not yet convicted.

If you are awaiting trial you can be harvested uh… swabbed. At that point you haven’t even been found to be innocent or guilty but they’re going to swab you. Why is this ok? Well, it hasn’t been legally forced in court but some of the arguments will put a niiiice surface on that road to Hell.

Rock Harmon, a former prosecutor for Alameda County, Calif., and an adviser to crime laboratories, said DNA demographics reflected the criminal population. Even if an innocent man’s DNA was included in a genetic database, he said, it would come to nothing without a crime scene sample to match it. “If you haven’t done anything wrong, you have nothing to fear,” he said.

Why, with that kind of reasoning, there’s no reason for everyone to not:

Get fingerprinted immediately

Get DNA swabbed

Allow at-will telephone tap devices to be installed full-time

Allow CCTV surveillance tapes inside your homes

Allow GPS tracking of your car not only for mileage taxing but “just in case, because if you haven’t done anything wrong…”

Submit to travel papers. Hey, if you’re legit, why should it bother you?

We should probably also cross-reference children’s DNA against the alleged parent’s DNA. If you haven’t done anything wrong, what’s to fear, right?

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Cataclysmically cretinous quote of the day:

“The thing that bewilders me is this president just cut taxes for 95 percent of the American people. So I think the tea bags should be directed elsewhere because he certainly understands the burden that people face,” David Axelrod said Sunday.

I mean these guys are disasters.

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Just so you know, I’m heterosexual, happily married (as well as anyone can be when they are married†), have kids, the whole works.

But… if I weren’t… I’d leave my wife for the guy who published a recipe for how to make a Hot Reuben Dip. No, “hot reuben dip” isn’t a metaphor. Literal.

A Hot Reuben Dip. My favoritest sandwich, turned into a dip. Good grief, I’d die and go to heaven after finishing this. Many thanks Kevin (Closet Cooking blog), and no fear, I’m not some Internet Wierdo. Weird, yes. Wierdo, no.

Update: The Tagine, which I made using venison, not lamb… fantastically rich, very complex, and is a true comfort food – I served it with homemade hummous, basmati rice, greek-style yogurt with cilantro and lemon, and a crusty bread on the side. Rating: ***-1/2

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[Warning: Harsh language and very partisan rhetoric ahead.]

I can only come to one conclusion. Our president is a pussy.

He goes to a conference of the Americas and listens to Hugo Chavez spout on and on about the US in an ego-boosting speech for 50 minutes.

He takes a book and calls it a nice gesture that Chavez gave him one titled “Open Veins of Latin America: Five Centuries of the Pillage of a Continent” – always good to give someone a gift that says “You’re a sh*t who profited off of me and mine – hey, let’s be buddies.”

He listens to all manner of BS and dissing from Amedinejad and still pursues and open dialogue. He (along with the rest of the world, apparently) watches Kim Jong Il build ever more dangerous toys and makes no comments other than there should be consequences.

Sayeth the Big O:

“The whole notion was that if we showed courtesy or opened up dialogue with governments that had previously been hostile to us, that that somehow would be a sign of weakness,” Obama said, recalling his race for the White House and challenging his critics today.

“… previously been hostile to us…” Uh, yeah, but when you’re showing courtesy, opening up dialogue, and brown-nosing dictators who are actively dissing you… well, that means you’re a pussy.

“You plant, you cultivate, you harvest. Over time, the seeds that were planted here are going to be very, very valuable.”

Wonder how many schoolyard scraps this guy has been in. Seems naive enough to have been shorted in that area.

Lest you be fooled into believing the whole argument, remember that Syrian installations bombed by Israel just a year ago (with US agreement) were nuke facilities being built along the lines of the North Korean designs.

“Opening up dialogue” won’t change that sort of behavior. DPRK wants money, power, and respect. Iran and Syria want Israel off the map.

My Personal “Things” – Don’t Peek

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